1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system for managing electronic data handled inside a hospital, and more particularly relates to how to transfer electronic data when transferring the data to outside the hospital.
2. Description of the Related Art
Currently in a medical field too, with the development of a network technology and an information processing technology, a system for digitalizing information used inside a hospital facility, such as information about various types of medical actions, accounting information and the like, and exchanging this via a network is devised and put into practical use.
For example, Patent reference 1 (Japanese Patent Application No. 2002-207822 (FIG. 1, paragraphs [0010]˜[0014]) discloses a system for exchanging medical information and the like by connecting an area information server provided for each area to a general home and a terminal provided for a medical facility in that area via a network or connecting each area information server and a comprehensive information server for exchanging data via a network, such as the Internet or the like.
Inside a hospital, with the advance of medical information connection system, such as a hospital information system (HIS) and the like, various data of a patient and its medical actions transmitted from examination equipment or a terminal device via a network is stored in/managed by an in-hospital server provided for each hospital.
It is considered that various types of information stored in/managed by the server in this hospital is used not only inside the hospital but also secondarily used outside the hospital. However, in this case, the rare data stored in the database of the in-hospital server is transferred to outside the hospital by copying it to a server outside the hospital. Alternatively, a service application outside the hospital directly obtains data field s to be secondarily used from the in-hospital server and uses them.
FIG. 1 shows how to conventionally transfer data to outside the hospital.
In FIG. 1A, each service application 102 for providing services using data stored in an in-hospital server 101 subsequently reads data from the in-hospital server individually. In FIG. 1B, an external server collectively sucks up data stored in the in-hospital server.
In the case of FIG. 1A, each of service applications 102-1˜102-n individually accesses the in-hospital server 101 via a network and reads out necessary data.
In the case of FIG. 1B, an external server 103 sucks up all pieces of data stored in the in-hospital server 101 via a network and each of the service applications 102-1˜102-n reads out necessary data from this external server 103 and secondarily uses it.
FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing the process of transfer data as shown in FIG. 1A.
FIG. 2A shows the process shown in FIG. 1A. In FIG. 2A when the process is started, firstly in step S101, information about examination is transmitted from each piece of examination equipment in the hospital to the in-hospital server 101. Then, in step S102, the in-hospital server 101 registers and stores this information in an internal database.
In this state, in step S103, each service application 102 for secondarily using data in the in-hospital server 101 accesses the in-hospital server 101 via a network to obtain only necessary information from the in-hospital server 101 (step S104). Then, each service application 102 uses this information to realize services (step S105).
FIG. 2B shows the process shown in FIG. 1B. In FIG. 2B when the process is started, as in FIG. 2A, firstly in step S111, information about examination is transmitted from each piece of examination equipment to the in-hospital server 101. Then, in step S112, the in-hospital server 101 registers and stores this information in an internal database as in-hospital information.
In this state, in step S113, the external server 103 accesses the in-hospital server 101 via the network to suck up and obtain all pieces of in-hospital information stored in the database and stored/accumulated in the in-hospital server 101.
Then, in step S113, each service application 102 for secondarily using data in the in-hospital server 101 accesses the external server 103 via the network to obtain only necessary in-hospital information from the external server 103 (step S114). Then, each service application 102 uses this information to realize services (step S115).
As described above, when using in-hospital information outside the hospital, conventionally each service application 102 directly obtains and uses information collected in the in-hospital server 101 (method 1). Alternatively, the external server 103 sucks up all pieces of information in the in-hospital server 101 and service application 102 uses only necessary (method 2).
In method 1, since necessary information can be obtained on demand by an out-hospital server accessing an in-hospital server, necessary information can be obtained and processed for each service application. However, in this case, the more the number of service applications becomes, the more the number of accesses to the in-hospital server becomes. Therefore, it becomes more difficult to protect security and load to the in-hospital server becomes larger. Furthermore, when a plurality of service application must be generated, a mechanism for obtaining information from the in-hospital server must be provided for each service application and the in-hospital server. Therefore, it takes much time and labor to extend the entire system including the in-hospital server, out-hospital server or service applications. In method 2, since all pieces of information in the in-hospital server is sucked up, information which a hospital does not want to go out of the hospital and information which a law/regulation prohibits from going out of the hospital is also sucked up. Furthermore, since all pieces of information in the in-hospital server are sucked up, the transfer amount of data increases to give a large load to the out-hospital and in-hospital servers.    Patent reference 1: Japanese Patent Application No. 2002-207822 (FIG. 1, paragraphs [0010]˜[0014])    Patent reference 2: Re-published WO02/017171 (pages 14˜25, FIGS. 1˜9)